Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Moment Of Truth For Airbnb As User’s Home Is Utterly Trashed

techcrunch.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 243 posts

Re: The Moment Of Truth For Airbnb As User’s Home Is Utterly Trashed

#111

Post by codyrobbins »

danilocampos wrote: post #97
codyrobbins wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Give me a frigging break! I don't care what the long-term implications are Clearly you’re not a business person if you wouldn’t care what the long-term implications of your company’s response to this were. They have responsibilities to investors, employees, and other users—they’re (rightly) making a decision with those stakeholders in mind, not the woman who had her house ruined. I don't care about cost Again, clearl…

> Clearly you’re not a business person if you wouldn’t care what the long-term implications of your company’s response to this were. Doing the right thing is more important than making money. I'm really glad I learned that before earning my business degree. I'll tell you a story. A couple of years ago, during the height of the financial crisis, I decided to quit a pretty safe job, move across the country, and focus f…

You’re patting yourself on the back for not selling a buggy app to people? That's a completely different situation than that in the story at hand. Airbnb worked precisely like it was supposed to—there were no bugs. It’s just that Airbnb is in no way supposed to prevent things like this from happening.

If you do harm

Again, you’re not addressing the simple fact that you’re working from the assumption that Airbnb itself did harm here. They simply didn’t.

Doing the right thing is more important than making money.

Clearly Airbnb does not believe that doing so would be ‘doing the right thing.’ You’re simply calling them evil instead of recognizing that they have a different—and quite defensible—point of view concerning their responsibility.

Re: The Moment Of Truth For Airbnb As User’s Home Is Utterly Trashed

#112

Post by scott_s »

Cushman wrote: post #101
scott_s wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Taking the same stance as homeowner's insurers do implies that they would be the insurance company. That's an enormous can o' worms.

Why? They insure one specific thing: a contract between two individuals that they trust. The only way they lose out is if they don't actually have any realistic way to enforce the contract on the renter— which would surely be a way bigger problem for their business than having to pay out some fraudulent damages?

"Some" fraudulent damages? If people figure out a reliable means to defraud you, they will do it until you fix the problem. And, congratulations, now your primary focus is fraud detection. You're now an insurance company.

There's also the fact that insurance companies are subject to many laws and regulations that other businesses are not.

Re: The Moment Of Truth For Airbnb As User’s Home Is Utterly Trashed

#113

Post by alex_c »

Cushman wrote: post #95
alex_c wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This opens Airbnb up to the risk of significant insurance fraud. Insurance companies have the infrastructure to deal with it, but Airbnb doesn't - and presumably doesn't want to build it.

Their attack surface is way, way lower, though. Airbnb would only be insuring the contract between two parties that Airbnb knows, so they're lightyears ahead of homeowner's insurance when it comes to recovering money from a claim. Fraud would mean the owner having an accomplice renter who destroyed something, Airbnb compensating the owner, and then being unable to track down the accomplice for redress. That's only a…

An accomplice renter - or destruction or property - isn't necessary. The owner can just claim theft, at which point it's their word against the renter - "They stole my HDTV!" "There was no HDTV to start with!"

At that point Airbnb is put in an impossible situation - they either pay for what may be fraud, or they refuse to compensate what may be actual theft.

Re: The Moment Of Truth For Airbnb As User’s Home Is Utterly Trashed

#114

Post by prodigal_erik »

ForrestN wrote: post #37

I feel really bad for all involved, including AirBnB. They must feel awful, and this is obviously incredibly stressful. I agree with the consensus that they have thus far failed to use this as a marketing opportunity (a la Tylenol) or even to mitigate much of the damage. That said, I would be absolutely fascinated to learn how this is playing out. It would be a huge service to the community for someone to release a b…

I'd been hoping those AirBnB pricks would be cratered for having built their business on spamming, not for something like this.

Re: The Moment Of Truth For Airbnb As User’s Home Is Utterly Trashed

#115

Post by alex_c »

djb_hackernews wrote: post #94
alex_c wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This opens Airbnb up to the risk of significant insurance fraud. Insurance companies have the infrastructure to deal with it, but Airbnb doesn't - and presumably doesn't want to build it.

This is precisely what insurance companies are for. Airbnb gets insured, it's customers file claims with Airbnbs insurer when things go sour. Insurance fraud is no joke and it takes a hell of a lot of stupidness to attempt it.

The problem is, as other commenters have pointed out, the activity facilitated by Airbnb is illegal in an increasing number of states. I'm sure that complicates insurance.

Re: The Moment Of Truth For Airbnb As User’s Home Is Utterly Trashed

#116

Post by mapgrep »

Sorry, but the moment of truth has already passed because the moment of truth was when Airbnb didn't bake effective safeguards against this sort of behavior into the very heart of their website for lending your home to complete strangers.

Honestly, if you explain the business model of Airbnb to any ordinary run of the mill US citizen not residing in Silicon Valley, their very first question is going to be, "Why would I trust a stranger in this situation?" Airbnb's response was a joke in their FAQ about a grand piano.

It shouldn't have been. I have rented vacation apartments in Europe and there are plenty of ways to do this RIGHT, starting with identity exposure. There should have been a set of procedures for people to identify and vet one another BEFORE completing the sale. Of course this would have meant that some Airbnb customers would cut deals directly with one another and screw Airbnb out of its revenue share. OH WELL. Safety has a price and a clever entrepreneur would devise incentives - rental history, quality public feedback and ratings - to discourage people from going outside the system.

This isn't just one incident Airbnb needs to respond better to. It exposes a deep flaw, not only in their systems for preventing these types of incidents but for responding to them as well (it took 14 hours and a friend's intervention to get a call returned from the "urgent" hotline, wtf?).

What is especially infuriating about this is that, in an effort to bolster their income statement and become a hot company, Airbnb has created very bad publicity for a FANTASTIC and growing form of lodging.

Re: The Moment Of Truth For Airbnb As User’s Home Is Utterly Trashed

#117

Post by rguzman »

dotBen wrote: post #8

When someone first told me about AirBnB I immediately dismissed it - just like Fred Wilson did. It fell in the group of ideas which I just find puzzling because the concept is totally alien to something I would want to do/buy/participate in. I don't get why anyone would want to rent out their couch or spare room to a transient stranger - even 'vetted' within a community (and we can see that vetted is very lose here)…

> The upside is a few dollars here and there

I am an airbnb host. If the upside were a few dollars here and there I wouldn't do it. The upside is 60% to 120% of my rent every month. I imagine it could put a similar dent into a mortgage.

Re: The Moment Of Truth For Airbnb As User’s Home Is Utterly Trashed

#118

Post by danilocampos »

prostoalex wrote: post #89
danilocampos wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm willing to go on record as saying the line is drawn at a sociopath willfully destroying someone's home and stealing their identity. It's pretty simple. If the user can't pre-screen and validate the guest's identity before renting, the onus is on Airbnb to ensure that they will not destroy your home . Besides, that's the only way this company can work at scale. Without trust in the system, who will use it?

There are databases for convicted felons and molesters, but other than that, how exactly do you ensure someone is not a "sociopath willfully destroying someone's home and stealing their identity"? Even if AirBnb had a way to check this guy out, it's quite possible he doesn't habitually destroy homes and steal people's identities.

> There are databases for convicted felons and molesters, but other than that, how exactly do you ensure someone is not a "sociopath willfully destroying someone's home and stealing their identity"?

Dunno. That's going to be Airbnb's problem to solve if they want to enjoy ongoing business. That's their job if they want to be the "Ebay of spaces."

Re: The Moment Of Truth For Airbnb As User’s Home Is Utterly Trashed

#119

Post by natural219 »

alex_c wrote: post #113
Cushman wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their attack surface is way, way lower, though. Airbnb would only be insuring the contract between two parties that Airbnb knows, so they're lightyears ahead of homeowner's insurance when it comes to recovering money from a claim. Fraud would mean the owner having an accomplice renter who destroyed something, Airbnb compensating the owner, and then being unable to track down the accomplice for redress. That's only a…

An accomplice renter - or destruction or property - isn't necessary. The owner can just claim theft, at which point it's their word against the renter - "They stole my HDTV!" "There was no HDTV to start with!" At that point Airbnb is put in an impossible situation - they either pay for what may be fraud, or they refuse to compensate what may be actual theft.

Simply integrate this with a rating or flagging feature. Make it strict -- one 'dispute', such as this, and you're on watch. Two in a short time frame and you're banned. etc. They can afford to pay for a couple of HDTVs so a couple of smart guys can profit off the service, and the legitimate users can keep on legitimately using.

Re: The Moment Of Truth For Airbnb As User’s Home Is Utterly Trashed

#120

Post by pdx »

jellicle wrote: post #60
tc wrote: post #21

> I spoke to Airbnb about EJ’s situation. They won’t reimburse her for damages This is bad news. They're going to backtrack on this. The sooner they do it, the better for them politically. I understand the problems of setting a precedent. And there really is no getting around the fact that the hosts do have the final responsibility for screening travelers (and travelers for screening hosts). But rightly or wrongly, t…

As was pointed out before, it's not possible to get insurance for this - homeowner's insurance specifically disclaims damage from renters, and it's generally not legal to rent your premises like this unless you comply with all the hotel rules, so AirBnb can't take out insurance either. All they can do is self-insure, and if they start paying out, people will realize "Hey, I can get a new TV if I let my friend come an…

It should be possible. I see this as the exact same situation as http://www.getaround.com/, who are, according to techcrunch, "The Airbnb For Cars". They have a policy with Berkshire Hathaway that covers any damage to the rented cars.

You can write insurance for anything, if you're willing to pay enough premium. I can't imagine this premium would be that exorbitant for Airbnb to pay for it's users, just as Getaround does.

Post reply on HN